


i love you, i love you, i love you, like never before

by Cafelesbian



Series: tell me how to breathe in and feel no hurt [11]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: First Time, Gentle Sex, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, extremely so, more like first time in a long time but
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-10-30
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:41:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27289576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cafelesbian/pseuds/Cafelesbian
Summary: “You okay, baby?”Bucky nods, muted with the emotion of what’s happening, the air quivering like a fireworks show.“Can I get a verbal confirmation, my love?”“Yeah,” Bucky says, faintly. “Yeah, ‘m okay.”“You wanna—you wanna keep going?”“Yeah,” Bucky breathes. “Just, um. Stay still for a second.”Steve, his voice wrecked with something warm and exquisite, whispers, “Of course, baby.”
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Series: tell me how to breathe in and feel no hurt [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1428403
Comments: 10
Kudos: 86





	i love you, i love you, i love you, like never before

**Author's Note:**

  * For [teenageraccoon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/teenageraccoon/gifts).



> ok i debated on writing/posting this because i really hate when sex is seen as like, the pinnacle of recovery or anything and i never ever want that to be the vibe of this story but i did end up writing it and i thought i'd put it here in case anyone else wanted to read it. to be really clear this is not meant to be like, a signal of how bucky is over all the things that happened to him and now ready to have a conventional sex life, it's jsut a moment between them that i wrote and that doesn't really affect the trajectory of the plot. anyway i hope you like this <3 cw for sexual content obviously but i really hate writing explicit sex so it's more implied and this is just a lot of romance and conversation. takes place about a year after the end of even in the dark.
> 
> this is dedicated to henry bc i made him read it ages back to ask if it felt like it fit the kind of tone i have tried to set for this work and he is always incredibly lovely to run thoughts like that by, love you king

June, 2016. Steve and Bucky are home and tucked against each other on the couch, the conclusion of a lazy, happy night. They made fresh pasta and fresh tomato sauce and ate outside, enjoying the brief week or so of the year where the temperature hovers momentarily between brutally hot and unbearably cold, laughing in the bronze evening light, retreating inside when the sun dipped low enough that mosquitoes felt safe enough to intrude. They have each already showered and found their way immediately back to one another on the sofa, where they are wrapped around each other watching a subpar movie starring Cate Blanchett that’s making both of their eyes glaze over. Bucky is lying on top of Steve, both their bodies cocooned under the same blanket, laying against Steve’s chest so that with each breath Steve takes, Bucky’s head is raised slightly with it. Some thirty minutes into the movie, Bucky tilts his head up and kisses Steve on the collarbone, then below his chin, smiling.

“Hello,” Steve says to him. Bucky, grinning, kisses him, their position such that it requires a shift of his whole body to bring their mouths together. Steve, smirking, kisses him back, lowering himself a bit so their faces are closer, so that when Bucky kisses him again, it barely requires any effort but the slightest tilt of his chin. The familiar, comforting scent of Steve’s body wash filling his lungs, something he is so used to that he doesn’t even always think of it as Steve’s until he catches a whiff of the same soap in a store or on someone else and is filled with warmth. Bucky, in increments, has slid between the back of the couch and Steve, but he is happy and safe and the feeling of being restrained does not spark panic. They must kiss like that for five more minutes, Cate Blanchett forgotten in the background, the still-slightly nerve wracking if welcome sparks of arousal racing up Bucky’s spine, coiling in his stomach. Steve, very obviously, feels the same. Bucky, feeling safe enough to do so, grinds his hips a little against Steve’s thigh, his breath catching, Steve’s hands going still against his back for a moment, then spreading into flattened palms, like any spot of skin where he is not touching Bucky is wasted.

“Steve,” Bucky mumbles, his voice full and hazy. His hands are on either side of Steve’s face, and their bodies are pressed against each other so that Steve can hear every hitch of his breath.

“Hi,” Steve says, with a small, gravelly laugh. 

“Steve, I, um. I wanna try.”

“Yeah?” Steve says, and grins up at him, breathless and dazzling. “What do you wanna do?”

Bucky kisses him briefly on the lips. “I want to have sex.”

They have tried a few times, ranging from disastrous, where Bucky flattened himself against the nearest surface and needed to be coaxed back for almost an hour, to neutral abandoned attempts. It happens every few months; they will have a night like this, they will be making out like teenagers, and Bucky will be visited by a startling wave of certainty, confidence that, historically, is dissolved the moment anything goes from theory to practice. Steve says he doesn’t mind, and Bucky finally believes him. 

Their sex life, right now, exists at a safe and mostly risk-free place, limited to mutual handjobs and Steve giving Bucky blowjobs. It has hovered here for over a year, with various experiments with other things that, for the most part, prove to be unwanted at best. Three times, Bucky has let Steve use a toy on him. Twice he had enjoyed it but felt, afterwards, overwhelmed and exhausted and needing to be reassured that he was not a slut. It is something, he thinks, about the vulnerability of it, the almost impersonal sensation, no matter how gentle and loving and good Steve was to him (and he was, always, always). The last time, two months ago, had been the first time it had been nothing but good, and he hadn’t woken up gasping and shuddering and thinking about being pried apart with hands and toys that did not belong to Steve. He has not pressed his luck since then. Sex, even when it is as good as it can be, is a taxing, draining thing for Bucky. It requires so much focus to stay present, to stay in a mindset that allows him to enjoy this without thinking it makes him a _little fucking bitch you want it you want it you fucking asked for it_ that even if he could achieve sex with no fear, it could never become an every day thing for him, something he could wake up with on Sunday mornings, still groggy from sleep, and enjoy while also mentally running through his day. He is still in the process of deciding if sex, at least—he always winces when he thinks of it in these terms, although he doesn’t know how else to—penetration, is worth the emotional undertaking it requires.

Right now, though, Steve so close to him in their home on a quiet summer night, Bucky’s body feeling elastic with attraction, his lips pleasantly numb, it feels like it will be.

Steve’s hands, steady and capable on Bucky’s back, go still. “Yeah?” he says, his voice a little caught. “Are you sure, Buck?”

Bucky nods. Their faces are so close, his hand laid against Steve’s cheek, and Bucky kisses him again, flooded by the knowledge that he is safe, that they have as much time as they could ever hope for, the night and their lives spilling in front of them, vast and incandescent. He is so used to this, the way Steve's jaw moves against his, the brush of stubble against Bucky’s skin, the exact place where Steve’s cheek hollows out when he opens his mouth, and it is never anything less than spectacular to kiss him this way.

“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I am.”

Steve squeezes Bucky’s hips gently. “We don’t have to—to rush, baby—”

“Steve, we’ve had two years of foreplay.”

Steve laughs, a little tremor to it. “I just mean… are you sure?”

“Yeah.” Bucky kisses Steve’s nose. “I have, um. Been thinking about it a lot lately.”

A dark glint in Steve’s eyes, the turn of a tidal wave. “Yeah?” he says, voice a little caught.

“Yeah.”

“Okay,” Steve whispers. “Okay. We can—we can try and, um, and if—obviously, if you change your mind, we stop the second you tell me.”

“Okay,” Bucky says softly. He knows this, but the fact that Steve reminds him every time flushes him with something bright and weightless, the same untouchable sensation as being cooked for and told by someone he loves that something made them think of him, a reminder, however necessary or unnecessary, that he is cared for, that the depths of which he is loved have stretched into someone’s life so much that they are consciously, purposely trying to make his life better. “I know,” he adds, and that makes Steve smile.

“Do you wanna go upstairs?” Steve asks him. 

“Mhm.” 

Even the walk upstairs is electric and shimmery as Christmas lights, both their hands thrumming with anticipation. Bucky, nervously at first, stops Steve, catching him by the back of his neck and pulling him into a kiss that very nearly knocks them both off balance so they have to grasp the railing to steady themselves. He kisses him, long and unbroken, crescendoing and dipping and shining like a city’s lit up skyline. Steve is the one who pulls apart and whispers, “Wanna finish this four stairs up?”

Bucky told Penny to lie down downstairs, and the cats are preoccupied in the kitchen (“They’re animals, Buck,” Steve says, when Bucky voices his concern that they will try to get inside of the bedroom, and Bucky replies “But they’re _babies_.”) In bed, kissing, is not very different from what Bucky has become accustomed to. Steve leans over him, his hands and lips and movements so soft, almost malleable, so perfectly safe for Bucky to shape into what he needs. They do just that for a long time, kissing slowly and breathlessly, lit by the lamp on Bucky’s bedside table and the occasional smear of headlights through the window, throwing a dust of white on them and vanishing, fast as a bolt of lightning. Bucky, gently, kisses Steve’s neck and chin and collarbone, moving over Steve’s skin in the shape of some imagined constellation, leaving a faint pink mark like he had pecked a kiss with lipstick there. 

Bucky tugs at Steve’s shirt first. Steve lets him. They fumble a little with the hems of their tees and end up standing, both smiling, their bodies outlined in the faint orange nightlight glow. Steve kisses Bucky as they stand, his hands light on his waist, rendered still and breathless for an instant by the thrill of warmth when their skin touches.

“I love you,” Steve murmurs, and Bucky makes a soft noise of agreement before working lazily at the hem of Steve’s sweats, more to signal that this is okay than because he’s able to pull them off effectively. Steve does most of the work, kicking them off and standing across from Bucky in boxers, before very gently pulling at Bucky’s. His fingertips brush the satin that Bucky is wearing under them, light purple, a lavender that hasn’t quite bloomed yet. He kisses Bucky on the face, on the neck.

Bucky wraps both arms around Steve’s neck and lets himself be kissed and held and loved. He feels like starlight when the universe first created it, he feels like the word _cherished_. Steve, against his neck, whispers, “Wanna lay down, my love?” and Bucky nods.

He is glad that Steve lets them go on kissing in bed. Arousal crescendos in his stomach; it is never unconscious, it is never something he can do thoughtlessly and lazily, but the fact that everything is purposeful, the trust he is allowing Steve and the way Steve handles it, cradles it, makes him feel weightless with luck.

“Okay, sweetheart?” Steve whispers. Bucky is glad for his voice, had not yet realized how much he relied on it.

“Yeah,” Bucky whispers back. They have been kissing for a long time. His lips are pleasantly numb. Slowly, nervously, he takes Steve’s hand and guides it beneath the fabric of the satin that makes him feel pretty, that makes him almost understand why Steve can look at him and be attracted to him. Even the compression of his skin under Steve’s hand feels gentle. They went to Rome in June and had gone to the Gallery Borghese and seen _The Rape of Prosperina_ , a name that made Bucky feel queasy when coupled with the objective gorgeousness of the statue, the way Berini had sanded down rock to look like something alive, the indent of fingers against skin looking so real that a childish part of Bucky had wanted to reach out and see if it would give under his hands. He remembers thinking about the intersection between violence and tenderness, how hard it was for people to tell the difference. How easy, then, to conflate the two.

But it is not now. Steve’s fingers against his thigh and higher, touching him the same way that Hades had in the sculpture, there is only love, there is no room to feel anything else. Hesitantly, Steve tugs down and Bucky lifts his hips so Steve can pull the satin down.

This is often the part where any tenacity Bucky had had when they attempt this evaporates. They are both still for a moment, waiting for Bucky to change his mind, but the desire doesn’t come and he pulls Steve into another kiss that makes Bucky feel wonderfully helpless, like he is Steve’s and he has only ever been Steve’s and there is nothing in the world that could alter that.

Steve is gentle. He kisses Bucky’s stomach, kisses between his thighs the way he would if he were about to put his mouth on Bucky. Bucky breathes and shivers, a hand light in Steve’s hair.

“You okay, baby?” Steve asks again. Bucky nods, and Steve murmurs, “God, you’re beautiful, Buck.”

Bucky, heart turning over in his chest like something with wings, pulls Steve back up to his level to kiss him.

“Buck?”

“Yeah?”

“What, um… is there a position you’d prefer?”

Bucky feels himself flush and hopes it is not visible in the weak creme brûlée lighting. “Um,” he says, voice a little high. “Could you… could you be, um, on top?”

Steve looks briefly startled, and then says, “Oh, yeah. Yeah, babe. I meant, um, like a literal position.”

“Oh!” Bucky flushes deeper again, burying his face in Steve’s shoulder to try and hide it even though that must make it even more obvious. “Oh, um.” A momentary wave of anxiety because he isn’t sure and he doesn’t know if whatever he says will be enough for Steve, but Steve holds him, pressing a kiss to his temple and wrapping his arms around Bucky so his body is shielded, so he feels utterly held while he breathes and thinks. “Can, um. Can we just do one where, um, I can see your face?”

Steve’s heart flips over itself with emotion, something almost like grief but mostly just love, awestruck adoration for the man against him. “Yeah, baby,” Steve whispers. “Yeah, of course.”

Bucky laughs a little, breathy and anxious. “Okay,” he says, and then pauses, uncertain.

“How’s this?” Steve asks him. He’s leaning over Bucky enough that if Bucky wraps his legs around Steve’s hips, he will be angled correctly. They used to have sex like this. It makes Steve smile vaguely.

“Yeah,” Bucky murmurs. “‘S good.”

Steve kisses him, their mouths so soft against one another, the sensations, sweet and delicate, of cotton candy about to dissolve to sugar. God, Steve loves him. “I’m gonna grab lube and a condom, ‘kay, love?”

“Okay,” Bucky whispers. Steve doesn’t go far, just across the room to where it’s tucked into the back of his sock drawer, but Bucky is happy nonetheless when Steve returns to him, smiling so warmly. “You don’t—You don’t mind, right? The condom?”

“‘Course not.” Steve kisses him again, light and brief. Bucky smiles. “You’re so beautiful, Bucky.” There is almost an ache in his voice, like he can’t believe his luck. It makes Bucky feel like popped champagne. Steve, his hands light on Bucky’s chest, fingers soft on the inside of his thighs, delicate and intentional as if he were playing a rare instrument. Bucky feels like that, his body plucked into high, soft music. “Bucky, baby? Can I prep you?”

“Yeah,” Bucky says breathlessly. His hand closes around Steve’s shoulder. “Just… slowly, please?”

Steve leans down and kisses his forehead. “Of course, my love. Tell me if you want me to stop, alright?” His hands tremble a little as he uncaps it and spreads it over his fingers. He uses more than strictly necessary.

Steve keeps kissing him, on his face and his neck and his chest. “It’s gonna be a little cold at first, okay? It might feel weird but if it hurts, tell me, okay, baby?”

_Think I’ve never had anything inside me before, Rogers?_ Bucky considers saying, but doesn’t, because that would involve bringing that part of him to the forefront of this moment and he doesn’t want that and his usual ability to mock Steve does not flare up because Steve is safe, Steve is making this safe for him, with his hands and his words and his endless patience. They have gotten to this point before, but already the terrible sweep of anxiety would be rolling through Bucky and right now, it lies placid.

“Spread your legs a little more, love?” He likes that Steve will guide him, that he will let Bucky not have to decide what happens but always have control over it. He moves his legs apart more, shivering at the vulnerability. Steve kisses his collarbone. “That’s good, baby, you’re so good, you’re so perfect Bucky.” Bucky must gasp a little, because Steve goes still. “Okay, baby? Want me to slow down?”

“No,” Bucky manages. “No, ‘M good, it’s good.”

Steve, watching Bucky underneath him, legs quivering like a shooting star before it charges, feels flooded in unspeakable emotion, his lungs filled with it, the room filled with it, the impossible trust that Bucky is giving him right now and the privilege of seeing something so beautiful that it justifies new language. “You’re so pretty, Bucky,” Steve manages, and thinks the words sound cheap. “So beautiful. Loveliest person I’ve ever seen.”

Steve takes a long time making sure Bucky is okay, asking if anything hurts, if he should change anything. Bucky has one hand on the back of Steve’s neck, bracing them both.

“Buck? You doing okay?”

“Yeah, I’m good.”

“Is it okay if I—”

“Y-yeah.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Bucky’s hand at Steve’s hair, tugging a bit, not enough that it hurts, his other hand on Steve’s shoulder, constricting when Steve moves in on the most vulnerable part of him, a shriek of sparks behind his eyes, not painful but not yet pleasure. Steve’s voice. 

“You okay, baby?”

Bucky nods, muted with the emotion of what’s happening, the air quivering like a fireworks show. 

“Can I get a verbal confirmation, my love?”

“Yeah,” Bucky says, faintly. “Yeah, ‘m okay.”

“You wanna—you wanna keep going?”

“Yeah,” Bucky breathes. “Just, um. Stay still for a second.”

Steve, his voice wrecked with something warm and exquisite, whispers, “Of course, baby.”

Bucky touches Steve’s face, thumbs over the line of his jaw, breathing and staring at him and trying to settle at the sensation of Steve inside him. “Okay,” he says, voice shaking slightly with the weight of the moment. “Okay.”

“You sure?”

“Mhm.”

“Can I—Can I move a little bit?”

Bucky nods. “Not—Not too fast, please.”

“No, of course not.”

“Steve?”

“Yeah?”

“Will you—” He swallows; his voice sounds thin and young. “Will you hold my hand?”

Steve smiles at him so warmly that Bucky huffs a laugh. “Yeah, baby.” Bucky retracts his hand from the back of Steve’s neck and weaves their fingers together, squeezing. Steve kisses his knuckles. “I love you so much, Buck. God, you’re so perfect.”

“I love you, Steve,” Bucky says, and feels giddy with the words and the closeness of their bodies. There are trees so old in forests so lush that underground, their roots run into one another and fuse, and Bucky thinks of that now, thinks of him and Steve like two intertwined roots. He laughs a little, breathless.

“Can I kiss you?” Steve whispers.

Bucky kisses him. Steve, carefully, his lips close to Bucky’s neck, rolls his hips a little, and when Bucky gasps, murmurs, “You okay, baby? Is this okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, god.”

Against his cheek, he feels Steve’s lips crescent into a smile. “Never seen anyone so beautiful, Bucky, god, _god_ ”—a choked gasp from Steve, Bucky kissing his neck lightly. “Fuck. God, Bucky.”

Steve moves so gently, probably slower than he would have liked, but it doesn’t hurt Bucky, it feels good, waves of electricity rolling through him and sparking in his stomach, and he lets himself be held while he is made love to, and that’s what this is, this is all love, no whisper of anything violent or terrifying. When Steve murmurs, “Can I touch you?” Bucky gasps out a yes and Steve moves his hand between Bucky’s legs, balanced mainly on his elbow, the rhythm between his hand and body making Bucky feel like the pre-tremors of a tidal wave, like something glittery and unstoppable.

“Steve,” he manages, when his body is coiled to tension. “Steve, ‘m there, ‘m gonna—”

“Yeah, baby, you are, that’s good, that’s so good, you’re so gorgeous, Buck, so good, my love, c’mon, you’re there—” And he is, the crest of a wave spilling over, churning water and bright light, his body shivering. He squeezes onto Steve’s hand and feels Steve shudder over him, another brief shock of pleasure as Steve breaks over and then, carefully, eases himself out, both of them trembling, and sinks beside Bucky, and Bucky has barely managed to orient himself before Steve wraps his arms around him and he finds himself burying himself against Steve, trembling uncontrollably, all of the indescribable adrenaline leaving him. Steve strokes his hair and kisses his face and tells him, “It’s okay, baby, you’re okay, you’re perfect, Buck, you did perfectly, I’m right here and I’m not gonna let you go,” until the trembling dies and he just lays in Steve’s arms being kissed and rocked and loved.

“Hi,” Bucky says a moment later, and finds his voice scratchy and thick.

Steve laughs and kisses his forehead. “Hi.” The room is sleepily lit, and Bucky could almost fall asleep now but he wants to shower first and potentially change their sheets. He sighs and kisses Steve’s chest, the place that requires the littlest movement from him. “You okay, Buck?”

“Mhm,” Bucky says. 

“Wanna talk now?”

“Not yet.” He feels rocked by what they have just done, pleasantly spent. “Can we take a bath?”

“Mhm. Want me to start it?”

“I don’t want you to leave.”

Steve hugs Bucky a little closer. “I won’t, baby. Promise.”

They lie there for five more minutes, the occasional spill of headlights washing their skin the color of undisturbed vanilla ice cream. Finally, Bucky rouses himself, first to sitting up and then to standing, a little uncomfortably, suddenly flooded with anxiety from the slickness between his legs and on his stomach and the ache when he stands. Steve, watching his face change, takes his hands and says, “It’s okay, love, what can I do for you?”

Bucky shakes his head. “I just wanna get clean, please,” he whispers, suddenly timid. Steve kisses his forehead and nods, then wraps an arm around his waist to help him to the bathroom.

They shower first. Bucky feels a little dazed, his body heavy with something sweet and perfumey but hard to keep balanced, but he leans into Steve and lets himself be held. Steve’s hands and body are kind against Bucky, moving through his hair, moving gently and chastely between his legs with a washcloth when Bucky says that’s okay. Bucky feels surrendered, almost afloat, tethered to Steve. He doesn’t realize how quiet he’s been until Steve thumbs gently over his face and asks if he’s alright.

Blinking water out of his eyes, he murmurs, “Mhm.”

“Still wanna take a bath?” When Bucky nods, Steve shuts the water off and moves across the room to start the bath. Bucky settles between his legs, their skin shimmery and unfocused under the water, blurring into one another. The heat reanimates him enough to lift his head and kiss Steve on the collarbone, on the neck. The water, now high enough that they can hug their knees to their chest and not have their skin exposed to air, is turned off by Steve. Around them, glittering pink bubble bath, the smell of rose. Bucky has not felt clean after doing that in as long as he can remember.

“How are you feeling, my love?” Steve asks him, and kisses his ear. Bucky smiles. He feels slow and sweet, like being preserved in syrup.

“Good,” he whispers. “Safe.”

Steve smiles back, moving soft fingers over the lines of Bucky’s face. “Did…” Bucky begins, and finds familiar shyness moving in on him, a sudden shot of hesitation. Almost, absurdly, the belief that he is about to be left alone, that he made Steve wait this long for something mediocre and frustrating. “Did you like it?” he whispers.

Steve huffs out a laugh but gently, its edges soft, nothing at Bucky’s expense. “Baby, yeah. I mean—I loved it.” He looks a little sheepish. It endears Bucky. “Did you?”

“Yeah.” Bucky kisses his nose, touches his index finger to a freckle on Steve’s cheek. “Yeah, I liked it a lot,” he says shyly. Steve’s face softens into unmistakable relief. He had wondered, small and nagging in the back of his head, if they would do this and afterwards, Bucy would retreat into a frightened, whimpering ball, begging Steve not to hurt him, and Steve would have to remind him where he was.

“Good,” Steve says. Then, gently, “You know, it’s—it doesn’t have to be an all-the-time thing, okay, baby? Even if we don’t do it for a long time, it’s not—I don’t want you to think there are expectations now.”

There is Steve, soothing the anxieties Bucky is fighting before he even has to vocalize them. Bucky, feeling utterly and unspeakably loved, leans his head back into the crook of Steve’s shoulder.

“I know,” he whispers. “I don’t—I did like it a lot. I, um. I don’t think it can be, like, an every day thing. Or even, um, an every week kind of thing. At least—at least not yet. Not ‘cause I didn’t like it, but, um, it just… it required a lot emotionally, you know? And it was worth it!” He smiles, and Steve laughs a little. “But I just… I don’t think I’d have the energy to do it all the time.”

“Sure, baby,” Steve says softly. “Of course.”

Bucky sighs, nuzzling into Steve’s neck. He could memorize the line of his collarbone, the slope of his ribs. “You’ve gotten better at that,” he says. “Not that you weren’t awesome before. But even better now.”

Steve really laughs. “Yeah? High school me hadn’t peaked?”

Bucky smiles. He unfolds their hands from one another’s and brings their fingers to line up. In the afterglow of what they’ve just done, their skin looks and feels thin, as if their hands should slip through one another’s, like clouds or holograms. But when Bucky puts a little pressure on Steve’s hand, he responds with the same gentle force and their hands stay suspended. They must have memorized the creases of each other’s hands, the curves of one another’s love lines and life lines. A scar just below Steve’s palm where, a few weeks ago, he had cut himself chopping carrots. Steve brings his fingers to fold back into Bucky’s and then brings their hands to his lips and kisses his thumb, lips brushing over pale purple nail polish. Bucky sighs, and they are quiet for a few minutes, caught up in the luck of this moment and this life, everything made exceptional, the faint lap of pink water against the side of the tub, the candle beside them, light blue wax coming undone. 

At some point, they untangle from one another and stand. Half dry, pulling towels around themselves, they kiss again, their mouths warm and soft and sweet as caramel. Steve asks Bucky if it is okay if he goes downstairs to make them tea, and Bucky nods and joins him. Their house feels very warm and very secluded, like an old castle long forgotten by everyone but its inhabitants. It would not surprise Bucky if overnight, several millennia had passed and everyone else was gone, no one left to remember what had happened to Steve and Bucky before they’d found each other. Bucky holds onto Steve from behind as Steve starts the water, face buried in his hoodie, a little needy, but Steve doesn’t care. He turns around and holds Bucky, aware again of how much smaller than him Bucky is, of the desire to keep cradling Bucky like this forever, nothing strong enough to force through and hurt him, not even wind or rain. He kisses the top of Bucky’s head, and the kettle crescendos to a shriek and Steve, reluctantly, lets him go.

When he has poured water over their respective tea bags and turned around, Bucky is leaning against the counter and watching him. His eyes look wide in the faint artificial glow of the stove light and his face is full of trust. It feels like something huge enough to bring Steve to his knees and to bring cities crashing down with him. He sets the mugs down and hugs Bucky again, steam rising beside them. Bucky pulls back far enough to kiss Steve, lazily and quietly and full of tender vulnerability.

“I forgot it could feel like this,” Bucky whispers. His voice is warm and tired. 

Steve cups his face, moves both his thumbs in circles over Bucky’s cheekbones. “Like what, angel?”

“I don’t know,” Bucky says. “Good. Warm. Safe.”

God, Bucky is going to be the death of him. Steve pulls him back into his arms, rocking a little, and kisses the side of his head. Bucky sighs, his body relaxing, and when they break apart their tea has cooled. Laughing, they settle on the couch, nestled against one another, content in the peace of their home this late at night, so few movements outside to pull their attention away from one another.

“Steve?” Bucky says, after a few minutes.

“Hm?” Steve lifts his head so that his nose brushes over Bucky’s hair.

“You, um.” Bucky twists his body a little, trying to settle again. Steve begins to rub circles over his back. “You aren’t, um. Gonna leave, right?”

“What? Buck, why would—”

“I know, I know.” Bucky has made himself very small, tucked entirely into Steve’s lap. “I just—I don’t, um. Want to be alone.” It is a difficult sensation to put into words, the response that flushes his body and tells him that in a few moments, Steve is going to stand and walk out, leaving him aching and shivering, or tell him to go. He knows, with utter conviction, that none of those things will happen. Steve, tonight and every night together before, has shown him that. It is just a leftover belief from a time when those were the inevitable conclusions to sex, and even though he does not hurt and he does not feel filthy down to the marrow of his bone like he used to after sex, being left alone still feels like something that could unravel him.

“Buck,” Steve says, very softly. “I’m not gonna leave you alone. Not tonight or tomorrow or anytime after we do this, if we do it again. We’re gonna be a hundred and a hundred and two and you’re gonna wish I’d give you a few minutes of quiet.”

Bucky laughs and closes his eyes, then kisses Steve in the nape of his neck. “I love you,” he says, so softly.

“I love you,” Steve says back. “So, so much.”

When Bucky has a nightmare that night, Steve is there, hands light on his back, gentle and chaste as ever, pulling him close when he is ready. Bucky shivers and whimpers into Steve’s chest, the terror exacerbated by the terrible familiar soreness in his thighs and lower back, even with the knowledge that where he is and who he is with are safe. “I’m sorry,” he whimpers, “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.” He sobs softly, adrenaline coming over him in waves of static. He had expected this even as he was drifting off to sleep, but that does not dull the panic.

Steve holds onto Bucky and rocks him a little as he cries and trembles. He is not surprised either, but he had still hoped this wouldn’t happen, that they would make it through the night and Bucky would wake up turning to Steve with a drowsy giggle and let Steve carry him downstairs for waffles. He kisses Bucky’s temple and murmurs, “It’s okay, baby, it’s okay, you’re okay, I’ve got you.” He swallows hard against the guilt.

Steve turns the light on at some point. Bucky stays buried against his chest for a long time, listening to Steve softly promising him it’s okay and remembering that he does not have to have sex with Steve again tonight and nothing that happened earlier was scary or awful. His breathing slows to a normal rhythm and he holds onto Steve and when Bucky whispers, “Can we keep the light on?” Steve nods without an instant of hesitation. 

After that, Bucky does sleep through the night. Steve wakes first. He does not rise to run. Bucky is still asleep on his chest, arm thrown over Steve’s stomach. Steve kisses his forehead. Bucky looks at peace, no crease of distress between his eyebrows, which fills Steve with relief. He had not been surprised last night that Bucky had woken with a nightmare, but it still sent grief sparking through him. Bucky had been unspeakably lovely last night. All of him, the delicate flutter of his eyelashes and his small, pretty moans and the quiver of his thighs under Steve, so beautiful he justified new words and religion, beauty that cannot be confined to any language. He kisses Bucky’s hair. The trust that Bucky gave him shimmers in his chest like something with a heartbeat.

Steve considers getting up and making them breakfast, but he doesn’t want Bucky to wake alone. So he lays with him, stroking absently over Bucky’s hair and listening to the gentle thrum of his breathing until Bucky’s eyebrows knit and he blinks a few times, his face a little hazy but okay.

“Hey, baby,” Steve whispers.

“Hi,” Bucky says, voice soft. He is almost shy when he leans in for a kiss.

When he and Steve had sex for the first time, Bucky had, the next morning, tried to consider the changes. Nothing magnificent, but he felt more grown up, the way you feel when you tell someone your age for the first time after your birthday: nothing solid or noticeable, but a faint thrum of pride at your own maturity. He had tried to remember everything, he knows that. In his memory, the hotel room and the raw morning light falling on Steve’s back and the far off noise of the ocean still sounding like it was rousing itself all still have a tint of importance, like the falling arc of a monumental change that wasn’t really monumental. He is vaguely aware of his current settings in the same hazy, pretty fog of importance. It is raining out, but the clouds are thin enough that the sun glows through, casting the whole room in a stone-colored light that gives the sense of almost being underwater. Underneath him, the sheets are especially soft; they changed them before falling asleep. Penny is at his side. By their window they have a small table that never gets used except to pile books and candles on flanked by two arm chairs, and Clover is sitting happily in one of them, her soft head tilted towards the window. And Steve beside him, his body warm and solid, his hands so gentle they could soothe wildfires. Bucky smiles. What a thing it is, to wake up safe like this, into a place full of unspeakable peace.

He studies Steve’s face. He knows its exact contours, and he tries to see if Steve looks any different right now than he usually does in the mornings. But he doesn’t. Steve is still disheveled, hair sticking up in indiscriminate tufts, a dusting of stubble that seems to have grown even overnight making him look tired, but he is smiling brightly and Bucky kisses him again, words failing.

“Breakfast?” Steve asks. Bucky moves to sit up and winces; there is a shot of discomfort in his lower back and below that is less painful than it is reminiscent of things he doesn’t want to think of. Steve moves carefully next to him, a soft hand on his spine. He kisses Bucky’s shoulder.

“Yes, please,” Bucky whispers. His voice is pleasantly hoarse. But neither of them move to get up; Bucky tucks himself against Steve, half in his lap, sighing as Steve brings one hand to stroke his hair. Bucky, a little tentatively, wraps his arms around Steve’s shoulders. Then, when Steve returns the touch, he holds on. They stay that way until Bucky lets go, untangling himself enough from Steve but staying comfortably in Steve’s lap, being held and loved on, his safety so insisted upon that Bucky’s throat grows a little thick.

“How are you?” Steve says, very softly. Bucky hums, a noise of unambiguous contentment. Clumsy and one-handed, he reaches to give Penny a scratch on the head and then lays his head in the crook of Steve’s shoulder, smiling.

They lay there against one another, listening to the rain and being comfortably aware of one another’s movements, the small shifts of their weight and the alternate rhythm of their breathing made louder by proximity. Bucky, abandoning the promise to get up, throws one leg over Steve and, with some effort, gets his whole body onto Steve’s so he can lie against his chest, even their legs woven together, Bucky’s hair falling wildly to one side so that some of it gets in Steve’s mouth, making them both laugh. There are no words yet; Bucky still feels a vivid, almost frightening vulnerability. Running from him to Steve is a fragile, golden thread that hasn’t been there before, something glittery and lovely but so, so breakable. They are both aware of this with unspoken certainty. There are so many ways, now that Steve could break him down; he has laid himself bare in a way that is utterly earth shattering for Bucky, and with it, he’s made himself weak again.

_Not weak,_ he thinks, closing his eyes, eyelashes catching almost imperceptibly on the fabric of Steve’s shirt. _Fragile_. Vulnerable. Trusting, Steve would probably say. They are all correct. Steve, his arms around Bucky now, half his face resting against Bucky’s hair, knows that there is a part of Bucky that is braced and terrified of something, some rejection or violence or expectation that hadn’t been there yesterday. It is not even entirely conscious to Bucky, but there is a tight coil of something vaguely familiar in his back that he does not need to know the name of to know that it is a weak flare-up of a watered down fear he used to be so used to.

But he breathes, listening to the comforting thrum of Steve’s heartbeat just against his ear, a closeness that always feels thrilling. Steve rubs lazy, loving circles over Bucky’s back, kisses his head every few minutes, entirely chaste, no hint of expectation or pressure. Even through Bucky’s eyelids, the silvery, rain tinted light breaks through so behind his eyes is something bright and delicate seeming. He could fall asleep again, here, but he does not want to slip away from Steve right now, even when he is so close, so he tilts his head up for a quick, lazy kiss. Their mouths fall together gently, something startlingly delicate in it, even though they have kissed like this a hundred thousand times. _Safe_ , Bucky thinks, the word popping hazily behind his eyes. And he lets it sit in his head, turning, then thrum through all of him, reaching Steve where they are touching, until being safe is everything around them and there is no flicker of anything else.

**Author's Note:**

> cafelesbian on tumblr
> 
> also posting this cause i feel like i finally have a grip on that third part so i should post that in like 1-2 weeks, basically i was debating on how much more misery to put s and b through and decided a fair bit but definitely not as much as i was originally going to and definitely more happiness than misery
> 
> comments/thoughts/questions are always wonderful
> 
> love you all


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